Resumen de Local Policies and Global Forces: Multiliteracy and Africa's Indigenous Languages

Tope Omoniyi

• This paper discusses the intricate connections between local education cum literacy policies in Africa and the global economic, cultural and political forces that impact them. Second, it argues that these connections negatively impact indigenous languages and undermine the attainment of mass multi literacy, which can contribute to the continent's development. The paper draws on data from Nigeria in the main with collaborating materials from a number of other African states to give an overview of the sub-Sahara African situation. In a final section, the paper explores the future direction of literacy policy research and offers some suggestions as to how multiliteracy might actually work.